The Clinical journal of pain
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A limited number of quantitative sensory pain tests (QST) were selected on the basis of ease of application and interpretation in a clinical setting. QST results were summarized as a composite score on a scale of 0 to 4 that was deemed to facilitate clinical interpretation. The QST set was used to investigate differences in pain sensitivity between low-back pain (LBP) subgroups and was correlated with important clinical parameters. ⋯ Pain sensitivity may be important for the prognosis of LBP, but QST is not currently part of routine clinical examination of LBP patients. The selected set of pain tests and the composite score of pain sensitivity could serve as a clinically applicable QST procedure in the examination of LBP.